North Korea is to blame, not Otto Warmbier | Column

My heart has been pretty heavy in recent days, after learning of Otto Warmbier's death. The 22-year-old University of Virginia student was taken hostage by North Korea while on a tour in early 2016. He was returned home in a coma and died less than a week later.

From all reports, he seemed like a guy who had it all going for him and was on his way to big things. The kind of person the world needed.

In many ways, he reminds me of my own son — adventurous and interested.

Salutatorian of his Wyoming High School class of 2013 (located in Ohio), Otto was a commerce and economics double major at the University of Virginia, and had just completed an exchange program at the London School of Economics.

He was traveling in China when he learned of an opportunity to join a five-day group tour to North Korea. This wasn't subversive or unusual. Thousands have embarked on the same tour, arranged by the Young Pioneer Tours business out of China. (I actually know someone who went on it, a few years ago.)

According to a Washington Post article, Otto's roommate during the tour, Danny Gratton, said there was chaos their last morning in North Korea. The hotel “mysteriously and uncharacteristically” missed issuing a wake-up call, and the group was rushed to the airport. While waiting to have passports checked, Otto was taken.

Gratten said “no words were spoken” when North Korean authorities whisked Otto away.

Warmbier was accused of having stolen a propaganda poster, and immediately — and publicly — sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. (While there is a video of the purported crime, it does not show the perpetrator clearly. And, as one site stated, it shows the hallway lighted, something that does not routinely happen in the middle of the night in North Korea, as electricity is scarce.)

It was a crazy charade. Clearly, the punishment didn't fit the crime. And, according to Otto's roommate, it seems unlikely the alleged crime ever took place. Otto was not someone who would have done that, Gratton said. And because of the rigid nature of the tour, it would have been difficult. Besides, it was a very large poster — one that would have been hard to hide in luggage.

In an interview, Gratton suggested Otto was singled out. He was young, American, and not traveling with a significant other. The farcical accusation suggests that Otto was taken as a hostage — a bargaining chip for the North Korean regime.

Shortly after his detention, he lapsed into a coma and never recovered. In fact, it is possible something happened in the airport. According to the Washington Post article, travel guides in China communicated with their colleagues at the North Korean airport. Warmbier was on the phone and said he had a severe headache and wanted to be taken to a hospital.

And that was the last anyone communicated with him.

North Korean officials said Warmbier contracted botulism, was given a sleeping pill and lapsed into a coma. Doctors here say that likely didn't happen, but could not tell with certainty since too much time had lapsed.

One lead doctor on the case said the type of coma Otto suffered would have been the result of hypoxia — lack of oxygen to the brain. How that happened is the mystery of his brutal detention.

His subsequent death in the U.S. was the result of something additional — possibly an infection or a blood clot. But no matter what, his brain had tragically deteriorated over the 17 months he was in captivity.

Regardless, it seems the North Koreans cared for him, medically, in ways others under the regime are never afforded. And that, too, is a mystery.

The response of many in our country has been shocking. Many blame Warmbier for traveling to North Korea. Others blame him for “stealing the poster,” believing North Korea's explanation of events.

There have been political jabs and partisan political commentary. Opinions have been voiced, often angry, uninformed and in some cases, downright horrible and ridiculous.

All I know is, a family just lost their son. One of the good ones. As a mother of an adventurous young man about to embark on his own life, I can't comprehend the grief the Warmbiers are feeling.

And I certainly would not want that grief played out on the world stage, with people debating every aspect of what happened.

Plain and simple: North Korea is to blame. Not Otto.

Heidi Hodges is contributing editor of Door County Magazine and a freelance photographer. Contact her at heidi@heidihodges.com.